Funny tread this have become. I might eat what I'm about to say but I really think we are filtering mosquitoes and let trough elephants. I'm sure that brute force can damage crystals but generally I believe tha= t problem with bad crystal is just a bad crystal. I also believe that you n= eed to take a look at the oscillator design to find out if there is to high amplification that might damage the crystal. There is a bunch of bad crystals in the market and you need to find a crystal that is good enough for your design and test it extensively before you decide to use it. When you have found a crystal that do not brake for as little as cutting the w= ire you are on the right track. Do some electrical testing and then use that crystal type from that specific manufacturer in the future. This is my suggestion to the problem. Some people might argue about that to high amplification can damage a crystal but I'm just superstitious and have th= at belief. Niklas Wennerstrand -----Ursprungligt meddelande----- Fr=E5n: pic microcontroller discussion list [mailto:PICLIST@MITVMA.MIT.ED= U] F=F6r Mike Kendall Skickat: den 17 augusti 2001 19:30 Till: PICLIST@MITVMA.MIT.EDU =C4mne: Re: [PIC]: Oscillator leads How about using a jewelers file. I've done this for cutting steel cable going through housings. The cutters would fray the wire no-matter how it was cut. A piece of heat shrink, then filing through the heat shrink and cable (in this case a lead) will really work wonders as far as shock elimination and fraying. Regards, Mike ----- Original Message ----- From: Alan B. Pearce Sent: Friday, August 17, 2001 3:02:05 AM To: Subject: Re: [PIC]: Oscillator leads > >> >shockwaves going up the lead > > > >A snip that makes a cut-off fly across the room will cause > >the equivalent force to go into the part that didn't. Maybe > >you weakened the crystal and made it susceptible to > >over-driving failure. As noted in threads about using crystals > >in rocketry and projectile applications, crystals will tolerate > >mechanical stresses in some directions but not others > > Not when you use shockless cutters (see my previous post on this thread= ) The > cutters produce a flat cut on one side and that means there is no wedge > formed to push the lead back in that direction. All the energy goes int= o > pushing the portion of the lead with the wedge on it. I will try some ASCII > art. > > > | / > --------------| |/ /-------- > component | / excess > lead | \ lead > --------------| |\ \-------- > | \ > <- no force cutter force applied -> > blades > > -- > http://www.piclist.com hint: The PICList is archived three different > ways. See http://www.piclist.com/#archives for details. > -- http://www.piclist.com hint: The PICList is archived three different ways. See http://www.piclist.com/#archives for details. -- http://www.piclist.com hint: The PICList is archived three different ways. See http://www.piclist.com/#archives for details.